


Greatest (Gift) Of All Time

by ArcadeGhostAdventurer



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers - Ambiguous Fandom
Genre: Crack, Fluff and Humor, M/M, and tony just wants to make him happy, steve has a huge heart
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-10
Updated: 2020-02-10
Packaged: 2021-02-26 04:55:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,035
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21718030
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArcadeGhostAdventurer/pseuds/ArcadeGhostAdventurer
Summary: Steve could have brought home a sickly cat or a dog. Really, anything else and it would have been fine.Or, in which, Steve got too attached to a goat that couldn't stay but Tony made it all beter in the end anyway.
Relationships: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Comments: 5
Kudos: 65
Collections: POTS (18+) Stony Stocking 2019





	Greatest (Gift) Of All Time

**Author's Note:**

  * For [FestiveFerret](https://archiveofourown.org/users/FestiveFerret/gifts).
  * In response to a prompt by [FestiveFerret](https://archiveofourown.org/users/FestiveFerret/pseuds/FestiveFerret) in the [stony_stocking_2019](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/stony_stocking_2019) collection. 



> For FestiveFerret's Short Promt: "Is that a goat?"
> 
> Ferret I hope you like this silly story. I saw your prompt and I was reminded of a very famous Turkish comic about a guy who goes into the supermarket to buy shampoo and comes out with a goat. So I had to write it. Short and sweet in the true stocking-filler spirit. <3
> 
> I'm also adding the comic here lol:  
> \- I will only buy shampoo. I will not buy anything else, I will buy shampoo and leave.  
> \- Mashallah! So fat! So rotund!!  
> ( https://i.pinimg.com/originals/be/c9/47/bec9474a1e8bbcebb27158b92192c784.jpg )

“Steve?” Tony stood at the entrance of the common kitchen area of the Avengers Tower and tried to make sense of what he was seeing, “Is that… A goat?”

“I can explain it.”

Tony tried to take in the grass and stuff strewn all over the gleaming floors, a couple tiny brown things that he just didn’t want to think about and the white fluffy animal that was licking the huge Himalayan salt lamp which had been Pepper’s gift to as decoration but his brain just didn’t want to accept the information it was receiving from his eyes, “I mean, I sure hope you do.”

“I went to the supermarket to buy shampoo.”

“That explains nothing.”

Steve rolled his eyes, getting up from where he was petting the goat as it kept licking the lamp, which was a scene Tony still couldn’t wrap his mind around, “Apparently there had been a problem with the transportation of these little guys a while ago,” Steve says gesturing at the goat, “they found the majority of them but a couple are still missing and, well, I found this little guy at the supermarket and decided to take him in until his owners can come and get him.”

The said goat, now done with the lamp, started exploring the kitchen area, his little hooves clicking on the tiles.

“So,” Tony turned to the impostor. Clearly, this was an impostor, “Who are you and what have you done to Captain America?”

The impostor let out a long suffering sigh, “Tony.”

Toy bristled. Okay, he was convincing maybe but he wasn’t going to let down his guard so quickly, “Look, I am the one who makes questionable impulsive decisions in this relationship, not Steve, so let’s give up the act real quick-”

“Tony,” Steve looked at him with his trademark Come On Now expression, so, okay, maybe this was Steve, “what was I supposed to do? Leave him there in the supermarket?”

“Yeah, okay, that sounds like you. He doesn’t look malnourished though.”

Steve sighed, “That’s because he was busy eating a 24-pack of toilet paper when I found him. And oh- I called a vet for that, I think they will have to take him away to get that fixed,” he grimaced.

“Okay,” Tony drawled, he was sensing… Things. Sensy things. Yeah… “So when are his owners picking him up?”

“I’m not too sure. Sometime this week and to be fair, they might pick him up from the vet too. We haven’t talked about the details yet. He is like a- An eating goat, I mean, not for eating, they eat weeds from people’s farms to help the cleaning process or something,” Steve followed the goat with his eyes as it licked and prodded things, “So they cannot work all the time and this entire thing set the owners a little back so… Yeah, I don’t really know.”

Tony looked at him, calculating, “Well, you know we can send him back ourselves. We definitely do have the money for that, if the owners are already troubled.”

“Yeah, sure. I guess.”

Tony kept staring at Steve, who kept staring at the goat as it explored. Yup, he was sensing things all right and he already knew he was going to be in so much trouble.

\---

Obviously, livestock veterinary care couldn’t be found in the city, or in any city, Tony assumed, so they called in a professional in at a ridiculously high price but at least Steve was happy and no longer wringing his hands, going on and on about blocked bowels. Oh, also the entire common area now smelt like a medieval barn and the goat had made a sizeable dent in the salt lamp.

But at least, Steve was happy.

He spent his days in the common area, (which, for the other Avengers, now was unofficially relocated to Thor’s living room because of the goatly smells and goatly residues and the goat itself), playing with the goat and feeding the goat and claiming he taught the goat tricks. And Tony had to suck it up if he wanted to see his boyfriend at all who, himself, smelt like a goat.

“Eating carrots is not a trick Steve.”

“But look, look!”

Steve hid the carrot under one of the three buckets he had and started moving them like a shell game. After a dizzyingly long time, he stopped. The goat nudged the bucket on the left, which had the carrot underneath and started munching as Steve gazed at him proudly.

Tony sighed. He wanted to claim the goat could probably smell it but… Well. It did make Steve happy.

Until they had to send the goat away of course.

The owner of the goat thanked them a million times on the phone for handling the animal and returning him themselves. Tony had Pepper deal with the transportation and such, considering she was much more knowledgeable than him about, yes, even animal transportation. Because who knew you couldn’t send livestock with a private jet. Not Tony, definitely. He asked her to make a small donation to the goat farm and please, for the love of God, to call an expert cleaning and decontamination service for the common area. 

In the end, it was like the goat incident had never happened. On the outside. Tony though, knew he had a much bigger problem at hand now.

Because the week after that was totally ridiculous.

Steve wasn’t mooning. He definitely refused to accept that he was moping. But Tony was literally right there and he could see Steve looking at the gauges the goat had made in the salt lamp longingly so really, he didn’t need Steve to accept it. He wanted a goat.

Fuck.

Steve could have brought home a sickly cat or a dog and they could have kept it. Really, not all of them were always in the tower but there was always someone and that was enough to look after a normal pet. Steve could have fallen in love with anything from a regular old goldfish to exotic tropical fish and Tony would have built him an enormous aquarium overnight. He had no idea what fish needed but there were professional care teams that provided aquariums like that. He’d hire one in a heartbeat for Steve. 

But no. Because Tony was a very lucky person like that, his boyfriend had to go and find probably the only free roaming goat in the entire New York. And not only find the animal. No. But also bring it home and love it so much that he was now looking at the photos of it from his phone and sighing whenever he thought Tony wasn’t watching. 

Now, Tony from a couple years ago had been more, uncontrollably impulsive. He would have bought a goat, stuck a red bow on its head and three days later gone crazy because he had no idea what to do with a goat. Nevermind the fact that goats cannot live indoors. They had just confirmed that.

But Tony had grown as an impulsive person in the last couple of years. He had learned to pick and choose his battles. Approach things… More critically and in a calculated manner. Be impulsive responsibly.

So of course, there was only one thing Tony could do.

\---

Empty schedules? Check. Avengers other than Cap and himself on emergency duty? Check. Late lunch reservation? Check. He had even informed Pep about clearing his corporate duties this time.

Well, Pepper had been the one who handled everything from the beginning so she already knew but still. He deserved some credit for improving from his past duty shirking ways. 

“Sweetcheeks! Surprise date time!” Tony threw himself onto the bed beside Steve, who was lounging with a book in his hand after breakfast.

It had been something that they compromised on. Steve was never too comfortable with sudden gifts. And Tony had way too many impulses to completely cut the habit. So instead of buying something cool but completely useless out of the blue, they had decided on surprise dates. Steve was always up for spending time together and Tony couldn’t deny he loved spoiling Steve. So, it seemed to work well so far.

Tony hoped this one, which stretched the rules of the compromise a little, also went well.

“Sure,” Steve ran a hand through Tony’s hair as he put the marker between the pages with his other, “where to?”

“That’s… Also a surprise. But it will just be the two of us, not, like, not a grand gesture, I mean, public and all.”

Steve squinted at him, “Should I start to get worried now or should I wait until we’re on our way.”

“Ha ha, so funny Cap,” Tony rolled his eyes at him but then gave in, “really though, it’s not like- Okay, it’s not an impulsive thing, like, I have been planning this-”

“Oh no,” Steve slumped over him on the bed.

“Steeeve! Come on, it’s not like that I promise.”

“Should I wear a suit? My good shirt?”

Tony poked at him, “Nope. In fact, you should wear your old jeans and trekking shoes.”

\---

Steve’s face, as they parked, was… A bit blank. Tony would have considered himself good at reading Steve’s facial expressions normally but right now, addled with his own apprehension, he was drawing blank himself. He pressed the button to turn off the car and wiped his sweaty hands on his jeans. He really wanted this to go well.

Steve pointed to the sign over the entrance, saying Captain’s Petting Zoo in big bold letters tentatively, “Is this? What is this?”

Tony cleared his throat, “Well, you remember the goat incident?”

“Tony, don’t call him an incident. Did you- Did you buy a petting zoo?”

“Well, not buy, not exactly. I may have kind of funded them though. The animal’s rights organization that I was in contact with wanted to open an educational zoo about farm animals for a while now. You know, to get the city kids in touch with nature and stuff. The grand opening is tomorrow but I wanted you to see it without the crowd and such, in peace. 

“And at first I was going to ask them to name it Steve Rogers Petting Zoo but then I thought that was maybe kind of invasive, you know, naming it like that without your input, and then I thought about naming it Captain America Petting Zoo but then that kind of sounded silly and- Oh my God, Captain’s Petting Zoo is even sillier than that isn’t it-”

“Tony.”

“Yeah?”

“You got me a petting zoo because I liked a goat?”

“It sounds really stupid when you said it like that but yeah; I mean you get to pet a goat, kids get to pet a goat. And to be honest, babe, I can get you a petting zoo. A petting zoo where professionals take care of the animals and we get to reap the benefits so why not? You should get to pet as many goats as you want to.”

Steve looked at him with an unreadable expression on his face, “Are there rabbits also?”

Tony scoffed, “Yeah sure, of course there are rabbits! What kind of petting zoo-”

Steve started laughing at him in earnest. 

Tony gaped for a second, then joined him, nerves finally abating about this entire thing at last, “You’re not angry with me, are you?”

“No. No, I’m not,” Steve looked out of the car window towards the farm areas, “God, a petting zoo.”

“So, you wanna see what they got?”

Back in the car about three hours later with their own goat’s milk that Steve milked himself (“Oh! It’s warm,” Steve had said, an enchanted smile on his face), Steve reached towards Tony from the passenger side and pulled him in for a kiss, “Thank you. This was… It was really the best gift ever. And to think that kids will get to learn here is-” He shrugged, “That really makes it special.”

Tony smiled at him, then the idea struck, “Greatest gift of all time?”

Steve stared for a second, then giggled, “Yeah. Okay. Greatest of all time.”


End file.
